Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) hardware business drove many contradicting loud opinions about the benefits it brings to the company. Some analysts claimed that the Fire product line is a waste of resources while others claimed that this type of portfolio diversification could drive Amazon’s long-term growth.

Throughout the years, Amazon expanded its hardware portfolio to include the Fire phone, Fire tablet, Fire TV, Fire TV Stick, Amazon Echo, and classic Kindle E-readers. At the same time that Amazon expanded its premium self-developed hardware products, the company started offering small commoditized electronics under the brand Amazon Basics, which include a portable power bank, cables, chargers, headphones, Bluetooth products, and other small items.

Last week, Amazon added another piece to its hardware portfolio when Annapurna Labs, an Amazon subsidiary, announced a new ARM-based platform-on-chip (PoC) product line named Alpine that could be used in a broad range of cases like WiFi routers, storage machines, low-power servers, video display, wearables, and IoT. Alpine is using 32-bit ARMv7 or 64-bit ARMv8 architectures, providing up to four cores of CPU, storage interfaces, PCI Gen3, 10G Ethernet connection, DDR4 and 2MB L2 Cache.

Amazon’s AWS division acquired Annapurna Labs last year for $370M to improve the power consumption of its data centers while driving efficient computational and storage capabilities. Launching a new product line of low-power ARM-based POC with advanced capabilities is an interesting development for Amazon that is targeting the rising demand for such products in the emerging IoT, wearables, network communication devices and low-power servers markets.

Even though it’s clear that Amazon’s Alpine will not compete with Intel (NASDAQ:INTC) in the data center arena, the launch of the new product adds support to the ARM-based server ecosystem that Qualcomm (NASDAQ:QCOM) has been trying to push for a while. However, currently, I believe that the offering of ARM-based servers is just not good enough to break the Intel monopoly in this market, and even if Alpine succeeds to gather some insignificant market share in the data center market, its most prominent target market is the access points/routers market, IoT/Wearables and personal consumer electronic devices.

At first glance, Alpine seems like another ball Amazon is throwing in the air to see whether it can succeed as it did with the phone and tablet products. Amazon’s Fire phones and tablets tried to penetrate saturated and overcrowded markets without offering real added-value to the end customer. In the Alpine product line, however, Amazon offers low-power, efficient processors with advanced specifications that could be used in a variety of devices. In my eyes, this is Alpine’s strength. As Amazon offers solutions for common problems in rapidly emerging markets, I’m carefully optimistic about this initiative. This could drive another successful revenue stream for AWS and position Amazon as a serious long-run player in the hardware market, something that should be taken into account. If Amazon could leverage the cost saving features of its new processors and sell them as an efficient alternative to the current ARM-based PoC, it could generate decent revenues in the future and would have a positive impact on the Amazon stock.

Amazon made a series of service announcements at its AWS re:Invent 2016 last week. AWS and Salesforce extend global strategic alliance delivering five new service integrations. The company which is the market leader in Cloud has no plans to slow down or rest on its laurels.

Amazon is quickly building out an ecosystem of sorts, which is driving its retail revs higher. AWS is at the forefront of the cloud market. Going by the recent client acquisitions, the leading cloud services provider isn't resting on its laurels. Lastly, we are headed for a strong finish to the year, as Amazon stock will ride the tailwinds of a strong holiday shopping season.

Amazon is off to a good start this holiday season. The recent launch of The Grand Tour has seen huge success. Amazon is in talks with major sports leagues to live telecast sporting events. Amazon expects live streaming will boost its prime subscription base which can be a growth driver for Amazon.

Amazon. com has been picked as a standout performer on Black Friday. The retailer is off to a strong start to Holiday season 2016. AMZN stock is now down 7% in the last one month. Is it time to buy in?

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